


Fear the Reaper

by Rapture38



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe, Bad to neutral harry??, Dark Harry, Death!Harry, Grey Harry, Hadrian likes to pick on poor Severus, Harry really hates voldemort, Master of Death, Master of Death Harry Potter, Mentions of Rape, Mod, Necromancy, Powerful Harry, but not really, feel bad for sneep snoop, harry is old as balls, no pairings for hadrian, sort of
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-13
Updated: 2017-11-11
Packaged: 2018-10-04 10:52:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10275584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rapture38/pseuds/Rapture38
Summary: Harry has been stuck in an infinite loop of rebirth for more than a thousand years, again and again, he would be born, live, then reborn. Now, he has been living in a bastardized version of his first life for 36 years, 12 of them spent working for the current dark lord. He had been content living as he had, no matter how mundane, but after an incident he decides that his slow life is over.





	1. Catching eyes from across the table

**Author's Note:**

> Prolog

It was in a circle meeting when he noticed it, the cold leering eyes watching him from across the large rectangular table. 

Green glassy orbs, focused solely on him, completely ignoring their master whom he sat beside. It was an interested look, like how one would look at a lover as they told them about their day, but there was no love in those eyes. Just malicious interest, which made Severus' stomach turn unpleasantly. 

Trying to keep his eyes from wandering from the dark lords form as he talked, he attempted to engage himself into the man's words, looking like the other sycophants' around the table. But, those eyes were burning holes into his forehead and he yearned to curse the green eyed man just to get those intense eyes off him. 

"Severus?" His name slid out of the lipless mouth like bitter poison. "Am I, perhaps boring you?" The threatening tone did not pass over Severus and he stiffened in his chair. 

Getting up from the high backed chair the dark lords bare feet made no noise as he prowled closer, feeling the oppressing power approaching him, the potions master clenched his linked fingers and starred hard into the golden brown table in front of him. "No my lord, I apologize if it appeared I was uninterested." 

The dark lord made a contemplative hum, "but, your thought do seem to wander today Severus." 

Sucking in a small bit of cold air,"I apologize, my lord." He replied curtly. 

"Maybe, you need you need a reminder about what you should be focusing on." Making a motion with his hand Severus couldn't see, the man that had been starring at him before stood up. "Hadrian, I know that our dear potions master has caught your attention as of late, I'll leave it to you to 'bring his concentration back', take it as an apology present." 

A sudden chill of fear creeped its way down his spine. Hadrian. This man was the dark lords right hand, his shadow. He took in a sharp breath of air, which made the dark lord behind him grin sardonically. His 'companion's' reputation preceded him. 

The cold smile that curved the raven haired man's lips, made Severus's stomach curl into a hard ball in his gut and rise into his throat. Hadrian 'The Reaper' the man was often called, was rumored to be nearly as cruel and powerful the dark lord himself, gaining his title from his nasty habit of practicing necromancy on his victims after days of agonizing torture, raising them from the dead just to torture and kill them again, sometimes they became temporary servants, but they never lasted long. 

Shakily standing on still legs, he pushed himself away from the table and made eye contact with Lucius, who watched him with something akin to sympathy. The blond probably knew they would likely never see each other again, and Lucius would not disrespect him or endanger his own life by defending him.

With a stiff nod, Severus' friend sent him a silent goodbye, which the potions master returned then turned to face his executioner, who stood waiting by the door with the same chillingly pleasant smile on his face. 

Taking his time, he was not in a rush to die, he secured his occlcumency walls and approached 'The Reaper'. 

Fighting his instincts to flee, he watched as the false pleasant smile morphed into something much more disturbed, a grin with too many teeth and stretched a little too wide to be fully human. The black feather mop of black hair swayed in an eerie manner to a non-existent wind, occasionally obscuring and shadowing luminescent green eyes. 

When he was within arm's reach, he couldn't stop the arm from wounding tightly around his waist and pulling him flush against Hadrian's body. The arm around his waist was painfully tight with nails digging into his skin but he made an effort not to pull away or fight back, he knew his odds. 

Hot breath suddenly brushed against his ear when lips gently brushed it and whispered, "Let's go play, potions master Severus Snape." 

And they were gone with a soft crack.


	2. Run Severus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Severus gets groped while Hadrian laughs manically

Landing roughly, Severus stumbled but the arm around his waist caught him before he could fall.

With a heavy scowl, he turned and leveled his eyes at the owner of the arm and was met with piercing green eyes inches away from his own. 

They were Lily's eyes. Stunned, he hardly resisted when hands roughly maneuvered his body against the wall. The crack of his forehead against the wall knocked him out of his daze and he hissed at the throbbing pain radiating from his head, his hands automatically scrambling for leverage on the stone wall.

When something warm and wet circled the shell of his ear he froze and the potions master attempted to cringe away from the wet appendage, but a pale hand tightly grabbed his jaw and forced his head still. His thin body forced even harder against the unforgiving wall as his assailant leaned his body weight against his back. 

"Now, now dear calm yourself," was the soft reply to his struggles. "I wont kill you."

That didn't particularly reassure him, there were many things worse than death, and 'The Reaper' was one of them. 

Severus felt a flutter of panic when the hand that hand been on his waist began to gently slide across his abdomen the thumb caressing the 'v' between his protruding ribs leaving a horrible trail of tingles in it's wake. A horrible sense of foreboding settling like rocks in his chest. 

The tongue returned to the shell of his ear with the graze of teeth and he shuddered. He felt dirty and weak under the man's ministration, the man that had him pinned to the wall was a monster and having this monsters cold hands sliding all over his body and touching him like he was some wore made him want to bathe in bleach. 

The hand on his stomach that was laying at a threatening pressure, falsely tentative slide down to firmly gripped Severus's hip, rocking him back against the other body while pushing his chest to the wall. 

"There are so many things I could do to you right now." The words were spoken not unlike the words of a lover promising the moon, his voice was soft and sensual but Severus felt nothing but the sharp pang of disgust. A nose nuzzled the crook of his neck, "I wonder what you would look like strung up, hands above your head, shackles binding you to the wall, helpless, alone, your hair caked in your own blood. You would look so pretty, don't you agree my dear?" 

Despite the man's promise to not kill him, he couldn’t help but feel like he would not make it out of this encounter alive. 

Making the split decision to flee, Severus kept one hand on the wall and with the other grabbed for his wand in his robe pocket. Making contact with the thick fabric of his black cloak, he groped for the lip of the pocket. But with a sharp snap, his struggles ceased and he dropped to his knees carefully cradling his limp jaw in his hands, he watched, almost in a daze as blood flowed out between his fingers and dripped onto the uncarpeted floor. 

Hearing Hadrian tsk'ing disappointedly, Severus did look up as the other crouched down to stare him in the eyes, a small unremorseful smile pulled his lips ups. "Now, why did you do that?" His tone was reprimanding, as if asking a child to recount their naughty behaviour. 

The older man watched with mild amusement as the potions master shock faded and finally absorbed what he had done. 

Reaching out he ignored the potioneer's flinch and settled his hand on top of the long black hair and began to run his fingers threw the wiry black locks. Unlike his own, this mans hair had suffered years of being exposed to potions fumes and bad hygiene habits. Maybe he would by Severus a hair cap for his birthday…and a good bottle of shampoo.

Sighing, he continued his stroking and tenderly said, "We could have this without the pain." 

The response to this was a gurgling sound and more blood being splattered on the floor. 

Hadrian crinkled his nose, maybe breaking his jaw was a bad idea, but he shrugged, he would heal it. A mild bone breaking curse was an easy fix. Humming softly, he continued to card his fingers threw the hair and rocked back onto his heels. 

What to do, what to do, Hadrian had wanted to meet with the infamous potions master for some time and have a little 'chat', that had been months ago. Now though, after a certain string of events he wanted the meeting for a different reason now. 

The circumstances to their meeting had been hugely miscalculated on his part, but he could still salvage this into something beneficial. 

"Now I'm going to heal your jaw my dear, but you must promise to be good," Best start off by preventing anymore incident's. 

The man's black eyes blazed fiery hatred but gave a tiny reluctant nod none the less and Hadrian smiled. 

Removing his hand from long hair he waved it in front of the shattered jaw, Severus gave a grunt as the broken bone realigned itself from the many pieces it was in and knitted together flawlessly. 

As he felt his jaw mending, he felt his hatred for the man who had shattered his jaw burn passionately like a dragons flame. It was demeaning to be kicked around and petted like an abused dog before it's master. The dark lord was the only man who he had ever bowed to, but then there was this being who crouched before him, equally as monstrous as the dark lord himself but somehow this was more demeaning than anything the Dark lord had done to him. 

"Good boy, now as much as I would love to turn you over and do unspeakable thing to you and your no doubt lovely corpse, I have come across some information you may be interested in." Hadrian said conversationally.

Severus didn’t say anything, just glared coldly up at the man. 

"Not going to say anything? Too bad, I heard you liked talking." A knowing smile smoothly replacing his pleased one and lowered his voice like he was telling him a secret. "Especially to a certain headmaster about things he shouldn’t know." 

It felt like a bucket of cold water had been splashed on his face, they knew. This was the reason he was handed off; gritting his teeth he glared unflinchingly up at the monstrous man in front of him. If this man was to be his end, than he would not go down without letting him know pain.

Hadrian clearly wasn't bothered by his plight, "Don’t fret my dear, I won't tell." 

Narrowing his eyes suspiciously, the potions master bit out, "What do you want?" The dismissal about his betrayal was much too casual for a loyal sycophant of the dark lord..

"It talks!" He chuckled, smiling gleefully, "But yes, what do I want?" Rubbing his chin, Hadrian acted thoughtful, although he knew exactly what he wanted long before this meeting. Dramatically he shot one finger into the air and shouted, "Ah, I have it!" Pulling up the left sleeve of his robe, he revealed an intricate black mark, one Severus was intimately familiar with. A tattoo with a skull and an intertying snake, a brand, one that he wasn’t supposed to have. 

In the beginning it was a rumor that 'The Reaper' was not a bearer of the dark mark. 'The Reaper's' high standing was a sign that he was a special man to the dark lord, one who had earned the right to be free from the mark, from being owned like cattle. The rumor was marked true when Hadrian commonly choose to wear muggle t-shirts on missions instead of the black battle robes. It was popular gossip amongst the death eaters, this mysterious man named Hadrian with no mark but was always taking part in the most horrific tasks. Eventually gaining the name Hadrian 'The Reaper' for his inhumane acts.

Now looking at the dark mark, imbedded into the deathly pale flesh, he noticed long, jagged claw marks running threw it. Hadrian had tried to remove it, much like he had, meaning that this had not been a mutual decision. How long had he had the mark for? 

As if reading his thoughts, a stony look chilled Hadrian's features, Severus immediately decided he preferred the inane smiles. "He told me he would never mark me." His tone was nothing like the cheery one he held before, it was quiet and unsuccessful in hiding the rage underlying his quiet voice. "He said that I had no need to be branded like a slave, that he trusted me."

Severus scowled but choose to stay silent.

Everything was silent for a minute before the cheery voice returned, "As I said, my dear, do not fret I will not tell anyone about your secrets," Fingers and thumb gripped his chin gently drawing his head forward, "As long as they become mine as well."

\-------------

When the door to his office, slammed open Dumbledore couldn't help the small jump of his hands at the noise, nearly knocking over his ink. Immediately after the loud bang, his potions master limped in, face bright red, fist's balled at his side and wand gripped painfully in his right hand.

Watching sadly as his ex-student further entered is office with all the grace of a raging hippogriff and starred down his nose at him, the headmaster couldn't hold back a wince at the look. 

"What did he punish you for this time my boy?" He asked gently, the subject of his punishments were always a delicate topic, even though the professor would never admit it so.

"Albus, my position has been compromised." 

Frowning in worry, the headmaster quickly stood from his desk. "My boy, what happened?" 

Ignoring the question, Severus's face darkened. "Though my position is compromised, it appears that my status will not be revealed to the dark lord." 

Pausing bewildered he asked, "How so?" He was confused, did he not just say that he was revealed. He doubted anyone that followed the dark lord would let such information slip by them. 

Gritting his teeth fiercely he continued, "The one who discovered my position wishes to...assist us." 

Albus guessed that this person was not one of Severus's most tolerated individuals. 

Sighing with a bit of relief Albus beamed, "That is great news my boy! Although that makes me wonder about your condition?" 

"The one who wishes to assist, was ordered by the dark lord to punish me for my inattentiveness and thought it would be suspicious if I left unharmed." 

Oh yes, Hadrian made sure that his injuries were real and relative to the kind of punishment the dark lord expected from him. Though some of it was faked, Hadrian made sure he screamed just once for real because his 'voice was pretty when he screamed'. The man was a monster in human skin no doubt, he remembered after he had agreed with the terms his wand was snatched from his pocket and tossed away against the far wall. He was then pulled to the ground by his ankle, back hitting the hard floor painfully before the older man crawled on top of him with a wicked smirk. His hands were than forcibly pinned above his head, lacking in the physical strength as most wizards did, he was unable to free himself. The man had than whispered in his ear that he couldn't let Severus walk out uninjured because that would ruin his reputation, as well as raise unwanted suspicion. Though the last part seemed to have been added as an afterthought.

From there the potions master had been subjected to a few mild curses that made the injures look like they had been done by hand over a period of time, rather than the seconds it took to cast. Which was slow and bloody, the route 'The Reaper' usually took with his victims and as well having his leg viciously pulled, resulting in a pulled tendon and the 'pretty scream'. 

When it was over nearly two hours later, Hadrian took it upon himself to maul Severus's ear while he was at it. Now his ear was an angry red and purple and burning like fire. 

Eventually, Hadrian deemed his work satisfactory, told Severus to grab his wand and make a show of leaving to show off his hard work and left the room leaving the door open to swing behind him.

Severus did not do the latter as 'The Reaper' suggested, instead he tried his best to slink out of the residency hallway (which he discovered he was in from the black drapes in the hall) without being noticed but sneaking around a building housing many death eaters was not possible, so he held himself with his usual stiff back, and scowl and ignored their snickers and inappropriate gestures, believing his limp was caused by something other than an injured leg. 

Dumbledore, apprised Severus carefully, placed an old hand on his shoulder in a show of comfort and took his lack of retracting as acceptance. "I think it's time we got you to Poppy, and on our way down enlighten me a little about our new ally?" 

The face Severus made with the word ally made Albus's gut clench unpleasantly. "I would not make the mistake of calling this man an 'ally' Albus his reasons for helping us are purely selfish." He gave the headmaster a hard look. "He would not hesitate to betray us if better opportunity presented itself."

Gaining a thoughtful look on his face the headmaster quickly weighed his options. Using this to get another spy Voldemort's ranks would be a unique and very advantageous opportunity, the light needed allies desperately, but he would need to be very careful. This man, as Severus described him so far seemed to be a fairly high ranked death eater if Tom was willing to allow someone other than himself pass out punishments. 

"What else can you tell me?" He probed.

Severus's mind mostly drew blank, there really wasn’t much he knew just rumors and what he saw of the man today. "I had never met him before today, and the rest of my knowledge is merely rumors."

"All rumors have a basis of truth, Severus." 

Scoffing at that he said. "He goes by Hadrian, his last name is unknown, but the death eaters began calling him 'The Reaper' many years ago." 

Albus raised a brow. "'The Reaper'?" An interesting name.

"'He is the dark lords favorite." The potions master sneered, "He never partakes on many raids only the ones that promise a challenge to himself, he is a necromancer known to practice his art on wizards the dark lord discloses to him." 

"And why would Voldemort's-" Severus flinched. "Favorite wish for his demise?"

Rubbing at his forearm, he remembered the pain of each calling and the deep scratches marring pale flesh. It was not hard to remember why he wanted him gone. "Part of being in the dark lords favor, he was never marked but during our 'session' today he revealed to me that he had unwillingly received the dark mark recently."

Voldemort forced a follower to bear his mark, it did not surprise Albus that Tom would sink to such a level but it was a wonder why he would betray the trust of his supposed most loyal follower? Was he perhaps suspecting disloyalty from the man? Or maybe he had withheld the urge to brand him until now? But what mattered was that the end result is the same, Hadrian clearly had some trust in Tom which had been shattered by the branding. 

"Is there a reason why Hadrian didn't wish to be marked?" He inquired curiously.

Severus shook his head, "I am unaware of the reason." 

Entering Madame Pomphrey's office, the smell of plastic and potions dominated the air and Severus's nose crinkled. Hadrian's room smelled disturbingly similar. 

"Oh my, headmaster Dumbledore what happened?" The medi-witch bustled into the room, the proximity wards having alerted her the duos arrival.

Dumbledore waved at her jovially, "Good afternoon Poppy, Severus here just needs a little patch up, he just got back."

Nodding quickly, she practically pushed the potions master to the bed. Pulling out her wand she banished his cloths onto a chair, sans briefs and summoned a cart filled with potions and wraps to her. Carefully with practiced hands she began to examine all of his wounds, and grabbing the appropriate potion to heal them along the way, she did this all with fast, concise motions until she reached Severus's head and neck.

Turning his head away, he knew exactly what she was looking at and bit viciously down on his cheek to stop himself from leaving and spitting some rather unsavory words at the witch. 

Dumbledore who was sitting in a chair on the opposite side of the bed noticed Poppy's strange expressions and asked, "Poppy, is something wrong?" 

Poppy's wide blue eyes passed from Severus to the head master, and without saying anything she quickly turned her attention to his legs, more specifically his inner thighs. 

At this Dumbledore's expression quickly went from confused to horrified, finally catching on to what she was looking for. 

When hands landed on his leg Severus violently pulled away, "I was not raped!" He hissed. 

"It's nothing to be ashamed of Severus but it needs to be treated." Her tone was hard and left no room for argument, but he resisted belligerently. 

"There is nothing to treat because I was not raped!" His temper flared. Hadrian was no doubt laughing manically at him, Snape was now aware that this is exactly what the man had wanted when Hadrian had roughly grabbed his thighs and bit his ear and neck. At the time he believed that Hadrian's was getting some perverse sexual pleasure from biting him, by the man's rough laughing it was not hard to believe but he now knew it was to make them think he was sexually assaulted so that he would be violated by a medic who believed him to be lying when he protested. 

Meeting the Headmaster's sympathetic eyes, Severus stared coldly back . "My boy, just let her heal you." There was a slight pleading note to his voice that made the potions master bite back a sharp retort. 

"I. Was. Not. Raped." He punctuated. 

"Severu-." Albus began but was interrupted by the potions masters growl.

"I was not sexually assaulted Albus, I assure you I am aware of what has happened to my person."

"Then you were willing?" Poppy asked from his other side.

"Nothing of the sort! I did not participate in any sexual acts, willingly or otherwise." His temper was raising violently, still the witch didn't move.

Poppy was giving him an odd look, as if she was trying to decide the credibility of his statement. "You must understand that people who come in with these types of injuries are usually sexual assault victims Severus, so I must be sure that you are telling the truth, how did you get these particular injuries then?"

Fighting back an ashamed blush he scowled heavily at the women's ageing face. "One of the dark lords servants was ordered to punish me for my behavior and he simply found the most humiliating way to do so."

She starred back incredulously, "And he thought that making it look like he raped you would be embarrassing?" There was a tad of hysteria in her voice as she tried to wrap her head around this man's way of thinking. "Monster, that man, doing such a thing, out of-" She trailed off.

Her face was quickly turning red in her anger, she could imagine the type of monster that man was, uncaring and ruthless, hideously scarred face and large groping hands, poor Severus. She wondered how lucky he was to not have that 'thing' decide that 'seeming' wasn’t enough and taking it all the way. 

Severus deep voice brought her back. "What did you expect from a man in the dark lords ranks, a casual sense of humor? Dung bombs and sticky string?"

Eventually Severus (with a lot of hassling from Dumbledore) gave himself over to the old witch, and thankfully she didn't say anything more about his misguiding injuries besides a few low grumbles under her breath. 

Later into the night, still slightly drowsy with pain relievers he managed to convince the old witch that he was an adult and could safely rest within his own courters. 

Not up for any conversation he swiftly informed the headmaster that he would continue his report in the morning and went down to his chambers where he proceeded to pass out fully clothed on the couch. 

\------------

Hadrian was near giddy as he exited his room.

His old professor had been so much fun to tease. He didn't remember too much from his first time around but he felt like the teasing was well deserved, so he didn't feel too bad for his ex-professor, it's not like he did anything truly terrible anyways.

A giggled escaped his mouth as he remembered the man's blushing face, beat red and flushed with shame. The teacher he remembered would have fought tooth and nail and made his assailant pay dearly despite concequences, rather than roll over and endure the embarrassment, he briefly wondered why this one wasn't the same. Also he remembered the potions master having more 'umph' in him, this Severus just kind of growled, the other one had a vicious bite to back his bark, that disappointed him mildly. He was looking forward to wrestling with the man.

But it did make Severus kind of cute, kind of like an angry pup, an odd smile appeared on his lips. Other Severus would kill him if he knew what he thought about his counterpart. 

His smile stretched more when to his right, a group of death eaters slunk closer to the wall and he smiled at them pleasantly, which only seem to make them cower further. 

"You seemed to have had fun, I hope you let my potions master at least able to crawl away." A salutary voice drawled.

Rage simmered just below the surface of his skin but he maintained his grin. "Oh yes my lord, of course, but it was a shame to know I could not keep him." 

The dark wizard smiled coldly, "When he no longer is useful to me you may have him." 

"Thank you, my lord." Hadrian grinned, returning the dark glee. 

Two red eyes scanned the raven haired man bottom to top as if searching for something out of place. Hadrian resisted the urge to rip those twin red orbs right out of its skull.

"I hope your still not upset with me about that...little incident we had, didn't my gift appease you?" Hadrian did not like the tone in his voice. The man was treating him like he was stupid, he had heard him use it on many death eaters before to make them feel guilt for not accepting his 'apology'. Of course they took it seriously and lapped at his feet repletely telling him how gracious he was, how merciful, how selfless; it made Hadrian want to through up. His voice, was so fake, it made him wonder why people would fall for it.

His grin faded and he eyed the man with clear distrust and mild anger, making sure he didn't reveal just how angry he actually was. "Slightly, you broke my trust my lord, it will take a while for it to be regained. Till than I think it will be best if we stayed a respectful distance, I will be returning to my home in a few days." 

If any other death eater besides himself were to speak as such to the dark lord, they would have immediately been faced with a hoard of defensive death eaters ready to rip apart any who disrespect their master. But being him, and in a private setting, he could get away with it with only mild annoyance from the serpentine man.

Letting out a sigh that sounded a lot like regret but he could tell it was annoyance, "if that is what you wish Hadrian, I will abide by it. Return when you feel like the trust between us could be rebuilt." Without a second after, with billowing robes the man turned and strode back down the hall in which he came.

Hadrian starred after him.

Breaking the dark lord would be so much fun.


	3. Uncle Haddy?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We discover more about Hadrian's past and Hadrian meets Draco and becomes Uncle Haddy, and Lucius wants to scream.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hadrian has some mood swings but I just wrap that in the bundle that is him being unstable, and I really fucked up one scene but I was too lazy to go back and not make it sound cheesy and so first story'ish. So deal and complain in the comments because I hate it too (you'll know what scene it is).
> 
> This whole chapter was written over the course of like 6 months, so everything is super choppy and out of place I'm sorry. It’s hard to find motivation now a days.
> 
> Also who here wants Hadrian to have an immortal form as well?? Like 'A master of death form', inhuman and that lives up to his title? Cuz I kind of want a form like that but I'm not sure if that would be weird of not.
> 
> P.S: MOST CHAPTERS WILL NOT BE THIS LONG, I JUST COULDN'T FIND A DECENT PLACE TO END IT AND I WANTED TO MAKE UP FOR MONTHS OF NOT POSTING.

Hadrian sat on his dirty bed watching inanely as his skeleton fish swam gently in their tank. 

They were always one of his first creations in each world, something small to test his powers on in a new body, also he enjoyed keeping them around.

He made sure to use the same souls in every world he came to, as he had become somewhat attached to the multitude of fish he kept around. There were 17 in all, most large and some small, they ranged between the size of his torso to the size of his pinkie finger. He had no idea what type of fish they were and he had no wish to find out, they were his and he liked them, that’s all that mattered.

As he watched, one of the larger skeleton fish swam as close to him as he could get, nudging its skull against the side. 

He gave the fish a small smile and stood up, walking over to the tank he scooped up the fish and he let fish flop in his arms in a mock need for water as he drew his wand and pointed it at the fish. A light blue glow emanated from the skeleton before it lifted off from where it rested on his arm and began to experimentally swing is tail in the air.

Watching the fish rediscover its air maneuverability was always amusing. "Come now, Hedwig, we have things to do." 

Striding out of the room, he could hear the air swooshing behind him letting him know she was following him.

The room he entered was the kitchen, or what he was sure used to be. He hadn't cleaned it in at least 12 years and he had no house elves or charms to keep it clean. Actually he hadn't even been to this house in 12 years, he had abandoned it with his fish when he was 24, a few years after he joined the dark lord and decided to stay in the mansion indefinitely. He was glad skeleton fish required no food and no attention or else he would have been a neglectful pet owner. 

With a fluid sweep of his wand all the mold, grass, and other plant life that had begun to grow vanished, with another movement the dirt and dust was swept away, and with a few more careful sweeps through the air the wooden floor fixed itself along with the cupboards and drawers.

Pointing his wand at the sink he cleaned the pipes and drum, turning he jabbed at the dishes scattered all over the counter (that he never bothered to wash or put away before he left) and spelled them to self-clean. Automatically water rushed out of the tap and a cloth floated in the air, the dishes did some weird dish dance as they went towards the sink to get cleaned. He chose to ignore that.

He nearly jumped when Hedwig brushed against his side; laughing a little he patted her and gently pushed her away.

Putting his attention back on the kitchen he began to search through the cupboards disposing of filth and banishing broken or unfavorable dishware. 

This was going to take much longer than he thought.

So he found himself for the rest of the day in various places around his house cleaning, organizing, and making it a functional home again.

By 11:45pm he was nearly done, just the guest bathroom needed to be cleaned, but that could wait till tomorrow. 

With a great huff he fell back onto his newly made bed, the soft plush sheets rubbing against skin. He enjoyed the smell of scented cleaner and the fresh air from the open window, the smell of old paint and mold now gone. 

Feeling a nudge on his arm he turned on his side to view Hedwig floating next to him. The skeletal body swaying side to side as it attempted to get close to him. Smirking, he wrapped an arm around the fish and pulled it close, laughing as the fish struggled and flopped in his grip. 

"Now, now my dear calm down." He purred, stroking the flat plate of the fishes skull. Slowly the fish ceased its struggle and gave itself over to the man's petting. "Tomorrow do you want to go on a trip with me? Daddy needs to go shopping." Many things needed to be replaced, like his moth eaten clothes. "It will be fun I promise."

Hedwig said nothing.

"Well, I hear no protest so it's settled, tomorrow we go shopping!" He declared stifling a yawn. "For now though, we sleep."

\----

The next morning was rough, when Hadrian woke, half covered by a thin blanket and freezing cold he remembered he forgot to light the fire place and to crawl under the thick covers last night. 

Letting out a hearty groan he peeled himself from the mattress, his stiff muscles protesting painfully against the movement. 

Blurry eyed and shivering, he shuffled to the bathroom, closing the door behind him (no fishes in the shower). Quickly he turned on the tap and let the steaming water warm the bathroom air. Once the air was no longer threating to make his balls retreat into his body, he stripped off his clothes and flung them into a corner and hastily jumping into the shower.

He moaned in ecstasy as hot water burned his chilled skin, goosebumps erupting along his limbs. 

About 45 minutes later was when he decided it was time to get out of the warm embrace of the shower. 

As he dried off, he purposefully avoided looking at the black mark on his left forearm instead he focused on the black vein like marks that were starting to creep up along his sides and shoulders. 

He knew where they were coming from of course, it wasn't a surprise, but they still fascinated him even after all these years. The large tattoo he had ingrained in his back was the source of the weird black lines. A line inside a circle inside a triangle, was the centerpiece of his back with long black branches like a tree sprouting from all sides. Each time he was 'rebirthed', the branches got longer, encompassing more and more of his back and shoulders, soon he wouldn’t be able to hide it with a tee-shirt.

Absent mindedly he scratched at his side where the branches had recently extended.

Getting dressed again in the same robe, t-shirt and pants he had been wearing for the past five days he finally left the bathroom, steam swirling around him like in a bad space movie.

"Hedwig!" Hadrian called into the house, "Hedwig!"

When a minute past and there was no fish, Hadrian went hunting.

Each room he went to it was sadly devoid of any fish like entity, he even checked the tank so see if she had returned to it, but no.

When he was on his knees searching under the bed, a sudden draft brushed against his exposed ankles startling him, slowly he turned and starred at it, watching the white curtains that framed the window flap almost in a daze. The window was open. Wide open.

"Fuck."

\-----------

 

When Hadrian arrived at the vaguely familiar bar, he greeted Tom the barman with a disarming smile before letting himself into the alley. 

From his very vague memory of Diagon Alley from his first life and maybe another, he thought it was very similar if not the exact same as it had been, but more run down. He had yet to journey to Diagon in this life and had no idea what it used to look like but seeing it in its current state was almost sad. A few shops were abandoned, with boarded windows and crooked signs, the corners of the street were collecting garbage like some filthy muggle alley. The alley was really looking it's age.

'Probably due to Voldemort's undisrupted rule', he thought. It seemed rational, with people to afraid to leave their homes more often than necessary and people closing down shops in fear of common deatheater raids, the deterioration of the once bustling alley was inevitable.

He himself never participated in any raids that were on popular locations where he knew children and families were. Not that his decision was made out of the goodness of his heart, he disliked harming innocents, they were not honorable deaths of soldiers, but horrific sacrifices for a madman who saw himself a god.

He never said anything about the pointless raids on harmless families or wizarding shopping centers though. Like a good follower, he turned a blind eye and let the others do their thing.

'Out of sight, out of mind,'. You would think that after more than a thousand of years of life and death it would lose all meaning, but no. He felt like his immortal state gave him a better understanding of life, death and the complex workings of the universe.

At one point though, in his earlier years he felt the indifference with the loss of life descend upon him and he was washed away in a whirlwind of violence and madness. With each death he caused he felt like he came closer to understanding everything, something much beyond mortal comprehension, and that the mindless slaughtering was just a stepping stone to something much greater. 

At first it had greatly confused him, but he decided it was just a Master of Death thing and left it at that. Eventually he grew out of the violence; that sense of understanding and being part of something divine wrapped him up and took away the urge to destroy. In the most recent couple hundred or so years, that urge to commit genocide on every race has not returned and he was more than ok with that. 

Turning his attention over to a little shop nestled between 2 vacated stores, a little blue sign hung by 2 browning pieces of twine that said 'Emsworths' used books'. 

The small unassuming store caught his interest, he had little money on him at the moment and he did need something fill his spare time with. Plus, it was unlikely he would come by here again after he visited Gringotts.

A cute little chime welcomed him when he entered the shop, and an old man at the counter looked up from whatever gadget he was working on and waved to him. 

"Why hello there, young man." The man gave him a genuine welcoming smile. "Anything specific ya lookin' for?" 

He always had a spot in his rotting heart for kind elderly people so he smiled politely back as he raised a hand in greeting, "Good morning sir, and nothing specific I just acquired a new house as of late and my shelfs are awfully bare."

The old man nodded sagely back before conversationally asking, "I see, I see, where'd ya move to?" 

Taking the man up in his offer for friendly conversation he replied," A small farm house just outside of Kingswoods, it's not that big but it's comfortable." 

While waiting for a reply Hadrian turned to look at the first row of books.

"Isn't it 'a bit lonely up there, unless you got a miss's up there with ya, it's pretty barren there lad."

Laughing Hadrian shook his head, black locks falling into his eyes, "No, no, no miss's, but I have my animals that live up there with me, that’s all I need. Anyways I enjoy the solitude I'm not much of a people person."

"Hmm, well as long as you're happy." Was the last thing the man said before turning back to his work and the conversation died.

Inspecting the rows of books, he couldn't really find anything of much of interest, mostly just spell books. Stuff he'd learned forever ago. There was a muggle fiction novel that caught his attention though, rectangular, thick and yellow paged, the printing so small he debated getting reading glasses. A simple tale of space travel, alien life, and self-discovery, having been through almost everything he found it amusing to read people's fantasies, stories that were woven together with a lot imagination and a bit of longing for something more. He would read and compare it with his own journeys, making his own snarky commentary in his head as he went.

Tucking the book under his arm, he walked down the aisles, eye's scanning for anything that seemed to pop out at him.

The next book that caught his eye was a glossy dark blue textbook type tome sitting, leaning slightly crooked on the far left shelf at the end of the rack. 

Putting his other book down on a random shelf, he snatched up the blue book. His fingers running over the smooth cover, he marveled at the effort that must have gone into the making of this book. Flipping the book on its back, he read the title, then again, and again.

"The History of The Potters" He whispered, "A Tribute to the Ones Who Valiantly Fought off He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named in the Battle of Godrics Hallow."

Hadrian stood starring at the cover, he had completely forgotten about the Potters. He had just assumed they were dead because Voldemort was still around, maybe he was right, maybe they were dead, but also maybe they weren't. 

Holding the book thoughtfully, he began to wonder if he worked with Dumbledore and the order that if the Potters were still alive he could meet them. Hell, maybe even his little self was around.

He always did wonder what his first parents were like, he remembers being told 'you look so much like your father' 'you have your mothers eyes Harry' and 'Just like your father' a lot. So seeing how much alike or different younger him was to his parents would be enlightening. 

Picking up the book he had discarded on a random shelf earlier and the thick blue book of the Potters history, he headed to the counter.

"Did ya find anything that tickled yar' fancy?" The old man asked, as Hadrian laid the books on the table.

"Oh, yes these books should keep me entertained for a little while at least." Hadrian replied, forking over 1 galleon and 4 sickles. Used books were cheap.

"Well good, happy moving lad." 

"Thank you sir, have a nice day."

Entering back into the alley he noticed it was significantly busier than when he entered. Casting an invisible Tempus with a wave of his hand the clock showed 12:56am. It had only been 12 minutes, where had all the people come from?

It was the lunch rush that apparently appeared. Death, he had forgotten about such mundane inconveniences being holed up in Voldemort's mansion for so long. 

The streets were bustling with afternoon shoppers but thankfully the street was not completely without elbow room. The amount of people though was making Hadrian's skin crawl with some unfamiliar feeling, every brush against his body made his insides twist unpleasantly. 

It had been such a long time since he was in a casual crowd of people that he felt like he was standing nude in a foreign county. He didn’t feel …right…normal in the sea of mortals that were just carrying on with their everyday lives, doing their regular everyday things.

He didn't feel like he should be part of this, yet, he was here, wading through a crowd of mortals just like he was the same. All of them unaware of what lurked amongst them. 

When a particularly small child bumped into his legs, he nearly struck out with his magic, but before anything could happen he reeled it in.

"Pardon me, sir." A small voice spoke up.

Hadrian gave a tight smile, "it's alright child."

Seeming to sense the danger, the child nodded jerkily and rushed off, presumably back to its parents. 

Watching the child go Hadrian got an odd look on his face, he was sure he knew that child from somewhere, he just couldn't place it.

Ducking into an alley, Hadrian decided it was best for him to calm his magic before going back into the populated street.

Pacing down the dark alley, he noticed it was longer than he thought. The alley got a little wider the farther he went down, it also got darker. Curiosity took hold of him and he reached out his magic to check ahead of him. There was nothing for the first 10 meters or so, than bright flickers of life washed over his senses. There were people at the end of this alley.

Had he stumbled upon some secret entrance? If he had than it wasn't hidden very well.

As he walked down the dirty alley the sounds of voices were clearly heard. Not quite clear enough to make out, but recognizable none the less.

When Hadrian finally reached the end of the cold stone alley he found a red wooden door with a rusted peek hole sitting a little below his eye level and no handle.

Reaching out a hand, he gave the old door a firm shove and surprisingly it opened. The sound that had been muffled by the door poured into his ears, talking and laughing, some pool balls being hit and glasses clattering. 

It was a shady looking bar, with even shadier looking occupants. A few looked up at his arrival and eyed him suspiciously while the others look away quickly. 

Hadrian eyed the place with a disgusted sneer on his face, it appeared he had stumbled upon the wizarding underground. 

A sudden living presence to his right made him turn to a middle aged greasy man walking a little too far into his personal space. His long salt and pepper was slicked back by its own oil and pulled into a high pony tail, his cloths weren't much better, robes were full of holes and some strange substance smeared down the left sleeve. "Hey there pretty man, what's something like you doing down here with things like us?" He breathed. "Get lost?" The man's rancid breath was enough to make Hadrian feel nauseous.

The Master of Death, stared the sordid mortal in the eye's, his lips curled up further into a sneer. Disgusting.

Whether the man was really stupid or too drunk to read body language he leaned in closer throwing his left arm that was smeared with the foul mysterious substance across his shoulders. The man then opened his mouth to obviously say something but let out a blood curdling scream instead, clutching his arm that he had wrapped around Hadrian to his chest and collapsing to the floor.

Nearly everyone in the bar was turned their way now, besides the few people that were smart enough to pretend they were suddenly blind and deaf.

Hadrian watched on dispassionately as the man's arm turned black and began to decay in front of him, the skin flaking off and becoming tight around the deteriorating muscle. 

The whole bar was silent as they watched on, more intrigued then repulsed. Most of them were more than likely murderers themselves after all, some were probably deatheaters. 

Squatting in front of the screaming man Hadrian roughly grabbed the man around the lower half of his face muffling his wails, making sure his grip was painful and tilted his head up. Closing observing the tear streaked face Hadrian smiled sweetly, like he was holding a kitten. 

"Senseless mortal, you should be more careful about who you choose to feed on. You never know, they might bite back." Hadrian's voice dipped into a low raspy tenor, quiet so that the inhuman echo in his voice went unheard by others.

The muffled screaming increased as the black infection that had consumed the man's arm was now branching across his face from where Hadrian's hand made contact. The man flailed and screeched, viciously tugging on the arm which hand was attached to his face with everything he had. The hand seemed to be permanently attached to his face, he could feel his skin dying and peeling from his face, the pain was like a flesh eating potion, pain, consuming everything, EVERYTHING. 

With a few more weak kicks and whimpers, the man's eyes glassed over and finally he went still and slumped to the floor, dead, his upper body being held up by nothing but Hadrian's grip on his face.

With a disappointed tsk' he let the rest of the body flop to the floor and stood up.

Grabbing a napkin from a table he wiped the snot and tears from his hand than banished the tarnished fabric.

Hadrian briefly glanced at the bar tender and gave him a slight nod, trying to convey a silent apology for the mess and that he was leaving. The man just gave him a look of acknowledgement before returning to his work like nothing happened.

He snorted mentally, he could tell the bar man was used to weird shit happening to him all the time, while the majority of the customers on the other hand just starred on, looking at the corpse with interest. Probably wondering what curse he used, because nothing known to this mortal realm could do such a thing to their knowledge; especially not with just a touch.

The corpse defiantly didn’t look like it was alive just 5 minutes earlier, talking and laughing with them, it looked like it had been there for weeks, left to decompose on the bar floor. 

Tis the touch of death.

At the beginning of his existence as The Master of Death, everything that came into contact with his magic immediately began to rot and die, the life literally sucked out of them. It was uncontrollable no matter what he tried. 

For years, death followed his every step, grass died and birds fell from the sky in his wake. Those were probably the loneliest and hardest of all his years to endure, he isolated himself in some un-plottable mansion that belonged to the Potter's and hadn't been used in good hundred years. Hermione, Ron, and his other friends had desperately tried to get into contact with him but every owl they sent to him was killed off by his magic. He imagined everyone was devastated when none of their owls returned, knowing that he had probably killed every owl they sent him. His friends eventually stopped sending, finally receiving the message that he wasn't going to respond. 

The last letter he received from his best friends was an invitation to their wedding. It was a pretty light blue with a small bow in the top left corner. Inside was a picture of the 3 of them together with a message 'Wish you were here'; Harry in the picture was splattered with blood and was in the middle with his arms swung over their shoulders smiling tiredly at the camera. Hermione, covered in something green, looked fondly exasperated and Ron had a goofy but relieved and generally happy grin on his face. It was mere hours after the finale battle and a week before he vanished, Collin's brother took the picture 4 years ago, he hardly remembered that picture being taken.

Harry had thrown up and cried for hours after that, he had missed his friends so much it had made him physically ill.

All that time he spent away, isolated from any human contact did nothing good for his mental health, he was unbalanced and depressed. In a search for answers and an output for his emotions he jumping head first into the dark arts, specifically necromancy. There in that house he made his first undead companions, many of them frogs from the pond nearby and countless birds(the owls), and they lasted because it's really hard to fail at pet keeping when the pet was already dead. 

From there he made more of an effort to accept his powers rather than suppress them when he realized the beauty in what he could do and eventually with time Hadrian learnt to keep the death magic just below the surface of his skin, covered with a fine layer of mortal magic, like a second skin. This prevented the things that came into contact with him a horrible agonizing death. 

Looking up from the body Hadrian noticed the non-human pub goers seemed to have instinctually recognized the presence of -death- a higher being because they were all cowering in their chairs. Bearing their necks and showing their submission to him. 

Without looking at anyone in particular he gracefully stepped over the corpse and strode to the exit, not paying attention to the way the wood rotted beneath his feet. 

Pushing open the two double doors that lead out he was greeted by another dark alley, a lot wider than the one that lead him to the pub but equally as dark and dreary. Definitely somewhere you would see someone like him hanging about. 

There were only a few people he could see in the jut of the alley that the bar was located in. All were garbed in long black robes that hid away any defining features and covered their face as they scurried along the walls like frightened rats.

Hadrian smirked at them. He found them amusing, little witches and wizards in their stereotypical shady hooded black robes with their dark arts books trying to hide their misdeeds from their friends and family. 

Looking from right to left Hadrian noticed he had two options on where to go. One, he could go left where there was a large archway that looked like it lead to a cemetery or he could go right where the alley seemed to continue around a left hand turn.

Watching a group of witches come around the corner passing him and making their way to the left he decided that he would follow them and see where they went. He would go right some other time.

Casually, he followed the 3 black clothed witches at a respectable, non-concerning distance through the large stone arch. As soon as he passed the arch the alley just seemed to open up. The arch had been disillusioned to look like an unappealing graveyard when looked at from the outside. Probably a precaution from unwanted company easily finding their way around. 

Now that he was inside though he could apricate the little defense they had, it would be a shame of this little black market (that was pretty well established) was discovered. 

It looked like an anti-Diagon alley, for the dark and murderous. 

Most of the occupants were understandably adults but a few had children close to their sides, a hand firmly on their shoulder or on their back keeping them from wandering off and getting kidnapped. 

The stores in the alley were innocently named, not that it helped make them any more inviting or hide what they were selling, The Crystal Vial, Talismans and other charmed items, Hanged man's den, Borgin and Burks, Uric's clothes for Every Creature. 

Hadrian made note of the ones he wanted to visit after he came back from Gringotts. Where yet again he got side tracked on going, but life wasn't an adventure if things always happened the way he expected. 

As Hadrian walked down the alley he noticed a few people that were blatantly starring at him wide eyed and he immediately assumed them death eaters. No one else would know what he looks like being the shut in that he was, except his victims of course, but they definitely wouldn't be standing there. He easily ignored the looks though and continued to window shop down the alley.

Many things caught his interest, the clothing shop being one of them, it looked like it had a decent quality of cloths and more of his style than anything he would find in Diagon alley or any main stream wizarding shopping centers. 

He tried to discreetly sniff his clothes, and barely kept himself from pulling a face at the awful smell. So many days in the same clothes was very gross and he hoped the goblins did not mind the stench of death and 3 days' worth of body odor. 

He could always try to charm clean his clothes again but he was afraid that if he did, his cloths would literally disintegrate. Transfiguring clothes was another option he considered just for this trip but even after a couple hundred years, out of his many skills he had obtained, designing and tailoring was not one. He would probably be refused service just because it would have looked like an eight year old had sewn his cloths out of felt.

Turning away from the shop, he nearly bumped into a young man that was standing directly in his path. He was about to say something nasty to the lad but he saw the clear adoration sparkling in the deep blue eyes as well as a healthy dose of fear, he hesitated for a moment before changing his mind.

"Can I help you?"

That seemed to snap the kid out of whatever trance he was in and he seemed to falter when he noticed he was being addressed. "A-are you The Reaper?" The kid stuttered, hands twisting nervously in his robes, he looked like he was either about to piss himself like an excited dog or pass out, maybe both. 

Hadrian cocked an eyebrow, "Who wants to know?"

The boys whole body flushed white. "Uh, My names Xaphan, uh, Markus Xaphan an-and-."

"You a deatheater?" He interrupted non too kindly.

The kid stared unresponsively at his face for a moment before he noticed the scowl making its way onto The Reapers face and immediately turned bright red while trying to quickly pull up his sleeve.

"Ye-yes, sir I am!" 

"Mr. Xaphan, why are you standing here making a fool of yourself?" He asked, keeping his expression Stoney.

Markus seemed genuinely startled at his cold tone then looked rather put out. "I-I'm a- your like, my role model. Sorry, when I saw you, I just never seen you around here and I really- you know, wanted to meet you." He breathed out nervously, "I mean, I've seen you at our lords manor but I wanted to actually meet you."

Hadrian softened his eyes a little but let a dark smile curl his lips, "I'm quite an awful role model, what do you admire about me?" He asked, almost purring, "The way I kill people, torture them, raise them from the dead just to start all over again?" 

The kid began to practically shake in his shoes, "I want to be a necromancer, but, I find it's so difficult, the most I can do is raise a house elf, even after years of practicing and you do it so easily, with so much grace, it's beautiful. What I've seen in books or others do, is nothing compared to what I've heard or seen you do. It's so amazing." 

Hadrian gave the young man a searching look, "How old are you?"

"I'm 21, sir."

"Stop calling me sir." He ordered, that just sounded weird, him being called 'sir'. 

"What would you like me to call you?" Markus asked cautiously.

"Just call me Hadrian." He decided. 

Apparently giving Markus the right to address him by first name was a bad idea because he suddenly looked very faint.

When he was about to scold the child for his blatant idiocy, his attention was quickly drawn away by muffled screams of what sounded like a child. Hadrian glanced around the alley but no one seemed to be paying attention to the sounds, everyone's heads turned directly to the ground.

Holding his hand up over Markus's mouth who was blubbering to him about something, he listen closely for the screaming again. It took a minute but it returned, it was hard to hear but it was clearly a young child crying out and screaming, something was obviously covering their mouth because it sounded really muffled. 

Knowing no one was going to do anything for the child, Hadrian sighed and turned to Markus, who was looking very surprised and very frightened.

"I have something to deal with, don’t follow me." He said, as he removed his hand and wiped it on his pants. It's not like they could get any dirtier anyway.

Passing Xaphan he followed the voice, which was steadily getting quieter, the sounds of desperate sobs and pleas lead him to an empty side street with black boarded up apartments and dead street lights. 

Up against one of the apartments that was hidden from street view, were two older men that were around his physical age, maybe older and one young blonde child about 8 or 9, the kid didn't even reach the two blokes chests. 

Immediately he knew what was going on.

Sliding a chilling grin onto his face Hadrian began to approach the 3, summoning his scythe to him and pulling his cowl over his head, shadowing everything above his nose from view. 

"Hello there boys, are you having fun?" He didn’t try to hide the echo or the guttural growl in his voice. 

The reaction was instant, all three of them turned to him and the two men pulled out there wands and pointed them at him but neither of the men letting go of the small blonde. 

Casually he shifted the long handled scythe behind his back so the blade waved horizontally over his head showing off all 4 and a half glorious feet of silver blade.

"Who's you?" Demanded the thug closest to him, "this aint none your business freak, scram." The thug was grimy looking, with plain black non-deatheater standard robes that were in more of a wreck as his own and probably hasn't had a shower in any recent weeks. 

The other thug didn't seem to feel inclined to say anything, and actually took a step back. Apparently one of them recognized him. 

The Reaper didn't often use his scythe, but it was something he was very known for, he had first fashioned it himself a long time ago when he learned of the muggle personification of death. His scythe though made by him sadly did not have the ability to harvest souls, unlike the iconic 'Grimm Reaper' which he admits to unbashfully imitating.

"You don’t know who I am?" He mocked, pretending to sound shocked. "Your friend seems to know me very well." Tilting his head to the side in an almost curious way he looked over to the other, "Do you intend to inform your friend, little death eater, on who I am?"

Just like Markus, thug 2 looked a mix of running for the hills and in awe. "You're The Reaper." 

"Don't be fuckin stupid, Tee, the Fuckin Grimm Reaper doesn't exist ya dumb ass," Thug 1 spat.

'Tee' didn't respond to that, just sent his partner a wide eyed look while frantically shaking his head.

Hadrian chuckled, "I don’t think he means that Reaper."

"The fuck you talkin' about?"

Ignoring the question, he pointed to the child. "I want the child."

The man gave him a nasty smile and almost as flipping a switch the man's hostility turned into one of evil amusement. "If ya wanted a go at em' you should have just said mate, but ya gotta let us go first." Then the man seemed to take that as a 'go ahead' to being to handle the child.

As quick as the thug was able to move his hand an inch and flick his eyes away from the dark figure, a long curved blade was sitting at the back of his neck and the thug was paralyzed looking into flickering emerald eyes.

"That was not debatable, mortal."

With a quick jerk of his arm to the side, the blade cleanly slid through the vertebrae and the rest of the neck. The head landed with a plop right before the rest of the body followed, blood spurting everywhere from the stump of the neck and all over Hadrian and the child.

He nearly revived the dead man for ruining his cloths so that he could make him pay for a new set of robes then kill him again but slower.

But before Hadrian's thoughts went further he quickly found his eye's locked with the small boys red tearful ones, but that he didn't let it last long as he faced 'tee' and smiled politely, "Pleasure doing business." and tipped his scythe his way, causing the man to flinch and stumble backward on trembling legs as he beat a hasty retreat, nearly tripping over himself on his way down the alley.

Once the second the man was around the corner he vanished the scythe and pulled back the cowl, and gently he grabbed the boys arm pulling him away from where he stood ramrod straight against the wall.

When the boy started to fight him, he asked, "What's your name?" as he started to forcefully straighten out the boys cloths and cast a few wandless cleaning charms, ignoring the boys pitiful attempts at a struggle like they were flies, and pulled up his pants, as well as discreetly checking for any injuries.

"I'm not going to do anything to you child, I need your name." He asked again, keep his voice low and calm, adding a little bit of compulsion to his words.

"Draco." The small boy said quietly.

Hadrian looked at him with a little surprise, "Malfoy?"

He got a little hesitant nod.

"I know your daddy, how did you get here all alone?" It seemed completely unlike Lucius to leave his spawn unattended especially in a place like this. That man was like a protective lioness when it came to his son, not one hair on his cubs head would be touched if that man had anything to say about it; wouldn't even mention the dark lord in his presence. 

Draco suddenly seemed a little embarrassed "It was an accident," he whispered.

"Just tell me what happened." Damn his soft spot for small innocent children forcing him to be all nice. "I will help you get back to Lucius."

Still starring at the ground he admitted, "I got some floo powder in my nose and I sneezed as I was saying the shop." 

Hadrian smirked, "Happens to the best of us," letting his amusement leak there his tone.

The little blonde ducked his head further.

"Well come on, let's go look, he'll be here somewhere, most likely having a stroke." 

As Hadrian stood up and stepped away he revealed the headless corpse of the thug and Draco couldn't help but look down at the body lying just behind Hadrian and promptly threw up all over Hadrian's shoes. Chucks of half-digested lunch and lots of liquid spilled onto his only decently clean attire.

The little Malfoy was absolutely horrified, both from the corpse and the fact that he just vomited all over his savior's shoes.

Closing his eyes and biting down viciously on his lower lip, Hadrian took in a deep breath trying to relax. He did this few times until he no longer felt the need to strangle the child until his eye's bulged from his head.

"It's ok, let me just try to clean myself up a bit."

Without looking at Draco, he drew his wand and pointed it at his shoes and silently cast a deep cleansing charm, the shoes could take it because they haven't been nearly as abused as his clothes. Pointing the wand at his chest, he did a delicate cleansing charm, the kind that was used to clean toddlers faces and hands.

It didn't do much for the blood that had soaked in or dried but it did get rid of some the wet stuff. 

A quick glamor and notice-me-not spell on his cloak took care of anyone noticing the disturbingly large blood stain on the front of his robes.

"So what shop were you originally flooding too?" Hadrian asked, as he motioned to leave the alley.

"Madam Malkin's."

Hadrian tried to keep Draco relaxed by having a casual conversation hoping that by keeping him distracted he wouldn't focus too much on what had just occurred and freak out. He asked about what Lucius was up to, he told him about how he made his scythe when Draco didn't ask, and when eventually they got to the mouth of Diagon alley Draco looked up at him and asked who he was.

"How about you call me Uncle Haddy." He said with an unrepressed grin, that would surely give Lucius a heart attack.

Draco just nodded compliantly and the two walked down the bustling alley, the child following so closely behind him that he stepped on the back of his robes a couple times. The fourth time his robe was stepped on, he reached down and grabbed the boys small hand pulling him forward so he walked beside him. The contact made him extremely uncomfortable but it kept him from getting even more irritated with the child.

"Come on, how about we get some ice cream while we wait, if Lucius is searching the alley he'll walk by eventually." 

After getting two small bowls of ice cream, plain vanilla for him and double chocolate with tons of topping for the little Malfoy, they sat outside the shop at a small white table.

An awkward silence descended on them, and they sat listening to sounds of people, it was kind of relaxing and anxiety-inducing at the same time.

Hadrian spent most of the time, starring down the blonde, he could tell Draco was struggling to come to terms with what happened and what nearly happened to him. His hands were slightly shaky, and his eyes were shifting around as if watching for someone to sneak up on him. 

They sat in the silence until they were both nearly done their ice cream, then Hadrian thought of something.

"How old are?" He asked bluntly, jabbing his spoon in Draco's direction.

Grey eyes scanned him suspiciously, "8," he replied slowly.

Hadrian frowned, "Really, I thought you were 5, huh." He was absolutely awful at telling ages.

The blonde puffed up incredulously looking terribly insulted, "How do I look 5?!" He squawked.

A smile a little too wide to be human lit up his face and he reached over and pinched the angry pink cheeks, "It's because you're so cute with your little chubby face and your big doe eyes." Hadrian gushed.

A couple parents who were nearby smiled fondly at them and Draco batted the man's hands away, pouting adorably. Now he remembered why he liked children they were so innocent and fun to tease. 

Once they were finished their ice-cream, Hadrian asked, "do you wanna take another walk down the alley?"

Getting a small nod they once again took to the alley. 

Nearing the alley to where he had stumbled across the shady underground bar, he spotted familiar white locks and the man was looking around with a tight look on his face. Never would Lucius Malfoy look anything but cold and resigned, but he did to the careful eye, look a bit haggled with worry lines creasing the corners of his eyes.

He was going to play a little with pretty long blonde hair, he wondered if he was funnier than Severus "Hey my dear, I just found your daddy." 

Draco immediately perked up, "Where?" He was practically bounced on his feet.

"You can't see him, grab my hand I'll walk you over." He said slyly and Draco too excited to pay attention didn’t notice his sudden change in demeanor.

As they approached, Lucius, who happened to be walking in their directed locked eyes with Hadrian, and he nearly felt the shutter of horror that ran down Malfoy seniors spine and felt a sharp grin creeping onto his face.

Then the moment was broken when a wail of 'FATHER!' pierced threw the air and Draco threw himself at his father who in turn eagerly caught him. 

For a moment the two blondes forgot about the other man, standing just mere feet from. 

Hadrian watched intrigued as the cold death eater he was acquainted with, kneeled on the ground and patted down his son, "Are you alright, Draco?" Clear concern in his voice.

Draco gave his dad a small teary smile, "Yeah, I'm fine, Uncle Haddy sa-." 

The death eater was immediately on his feet, "What did you do to my son?" He demanded with all the ferocity of the death eater he was, his wand clenched tightly in his hand, tip pointing directly at Hadrian's chest.

The grin on his face grew positively predatory, "What makes you think I did anything to your son?"

Lucius looked absolutely livid.

"Father, he didn't do anything to me," Draco spoke up quietly, confused as to why his father was being so mean to the man who had saved him, "I-I came out of a floo in Knockturn alley an-and I tried to find you but these two ugly men grabbed me an-and, they almost-." His hands were shaking, his robe all balled up into his fists. "He found me."

A lightbulb went off in his head, 'So that's what the alleys called.' Hadrian noted absent mindedly.

Lucius's face was turning alarmingly red and looked like he was about to ring his son for answers, so Hadrian decided now was a good time to step in. 

"Draco was very lucky that today was the day I choose to go exploring." He drawled, looking at Lucius threw his eyelashes. "When I heard screams coming from an alley I had every intention of leaving, but then I saw everyone just ignoring it and I just had to go investigate, and low and behold your son was in need of rescue."

"Ya, then we went and searched for you and got ice cream." Draco piped in nervously, obviously forgoing the part where he proceeded to decapitate a man.

Hadrian almost laughed at the constipated face Lucius was making, "Well Draco, it was very nice meeting you but I have business to attend to, though I have a feeling we will be seeing each other in the very near future." He said as he patted the child on the head. "And goodbye to you too dear Lucius." Hadrian added with a deadly grin, and began to walk past Lucius before stopping when his shoulder was just brushing with the mans. "Your son was almost raped and murdered today Lucius, I'll be thinking of a good way for you to repay me for my good deed." and he left.

\------------------------------- (I'm tired so this is going to come out bad, and I'm too lazy to rewrite later)

The bank was surprisingly empty when he entered so he didn't have to wait to see a goblin and waltzed right up to a teller a huge grin nearly splitting his face. 

"Hello good sir, I'm here to seek my inheritance." He greeted jovially.

The goblin didn't even glance up from his desk and replied blandly, "Your name, wizard?"

Not losing any of his cheer he said, "Hadrian Whitaker." 

Without saying anything to him the goblin put a small knife and a scroll on the desk from somewhere under the desk and unrolled it. "Put 3 drops of your blood here." He directed, pointing to a black circle at the bottom of the page.

Hadrian complied nicking a finger, as soon as the blood hit the page a 3 digit number bled out on a blank line to the right of the circle. 3-7-6.

"It does seem that you have a vault here." 

The wizard stared at the goblin-like it was the most obvious thing in the world, and the goblin just grunted. 

Another goblin, a little scruffier looking, appeared to his left to take him to his vault. The ride in the cart was nothing special and was done with quickly; he withdrew enough money, bought an overpriced bottomless pouch from the goblin and made his way back to the surface.

He wasn't rich per-say, but in this life, his parents had left him with a generous amount of money after they were 'tragically killed' by deatheaters during a raid in Diagon alley. 

After returning to 'Knockturn alley' Hadrian spent the next 4 hours store hopping and bargaining with stingy shop owners. But even with all the hustling he did, he came out on top, satisfied with the apparel he perchance which was a pair of plain black outer robes with the flowy sleeves that he likes, 3 black dress shirts, 1 pair of black kakis and one grey (mixing it up), as well as another pair of black pants, and to finish it all off a nice new dragonhide boots. 

Once apparating home, he immediately noticed an unfamiliar owl with a roll of parchment tied to its leg, perched on a tree branch beside his front door. It was staring at him with its intense yellow eyes like it was judging him to be persecuted or something. 

"What"? He asked the owl, it fluffed it feathers in response. "I'm going inside owl, follow me if you want."

As he opened the door he heard the distinct fluttering of wings and he instinctively ducked as the owl swooped over his head. Hadrian watched the bird land on one of his dining room chairs and turn to look back at him.

Dropping his bag of cloths by the door, he approached the bird and it stuck its leg out for him.

Hadrian was curious as to who had written him a letter, there were not many people who knew his name to write to him. It certainly wasn't Warty, was it?

Unrolling the scroll he skipped the whole paragraph and went straight to were the sender's name would be signed.

Hadrian couldn't hold it in, he threw his head back and let out a bone-chilling, manic laugh that echoed like rattling chains in the empty house. 

Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry,  
ALBUS. W.B. DUMBLEDORE


End file.
